Mac Keystrokes

That's right, this is a Mac article. Sorry, Windows users, you'll have to wait until next week.

There are a number of useful keystrokes that you might have already heard about, but maybe a few you haven't, or maybe you know them but just don't use them that much. This is a cry for help. I am a keystroke. My name is command-tab. Please use me. I'll make your life so much better. I promise.

Go ahead, try command-tab. Hold the command key (aka the Open Apple key) and hit tab once. A list of icons pops up. These are your currently running applications. Keep holding command and then hit tab repeatedly until you get to the application you want to switch to. Then release. Ahh.

Other useful keystrokes include:
command-spacebar : search (Spotlight)
command-z : undo
command-x : cut
command-c : copy
command-v : paste
command-s : save
command-p : print
command-q : quit

-Webb

One-Hit Wonderful

Good new songs are coming out all the time. A number of years ago I heard the Lilys' "With Candy" (2006) on Pandora. The song is a loosely organized beautiful mess. The drums during the verses never seen to line up where you think they should, and then the jangly guitars and lilting synth pads and vocals float above the chorus. The hipsters behind the counter mocked me subtly for buying the album, but I was undeterred. It turned out they were right. The album, I am sorry to say, was terrible.

This isn't the first (or last) time this has happened. Remember Peter Bjorn & John's "Young Folks" single? Catchy beat, haunting whistle solo, the song, though overplayed, was a masterpiece. But the album stank. I had a similar disappointing experience after hearing Clap Your Hands Say Yeah's "In This Home on Ice" (2005), and Bear In Heaven's "Lovesick Teenagers" (2009). Why is it that some bands can create a great song, but not a great album?

This past year, two songs stood out to me as dramatically better than the albums they came from: "Pumped Up Kicks" (2010), by Foster The People, and "When I'm With You" (2010), by Best Coast. "Pumped Up Kicks" begins with a simple yet seductive bass line, joined by tin-can vocals and a a chorus that goes:

All the other kids with the pumped up kicks
you'd better run better run
faster than my bullet

Best Coast's 2010 Crazy For You is probably the best album on the list, but overall it pales in comparison to the quality of the single, "When I'm With You." Bethany Cosentino's far away yet emotionally present vocals repeat the lines "When I'm with you, I have fun" almost to the point of insanity, but it works. This song draws you in to its own world of oozing cutesy sentiment with a rock timelessness that could only have been created now. Just don't buy the album before listening to it.

Click here to listen to the tracks mentioned in this article.

-Webb

The Joy of Search

Search is one of the most basic functions your computer provides. You often want to find a file you were working on, or a web page, or an email. Where computers fail is at integrating all of these search functions into one easy-to-use program. Google dominates internet search, whereas searching for local files is governed by your operating system, but what if I want to do both at once?

On a Mac, the local search feature is known as Spotlight. Click the magnifying glass in the upper-right corner of the screen, or simply press command-spacebar. Then start typing. Find recently opened documents, definitions for words...you can even type "2+2" and "4" appears. Documents are searched both by file name and by contents, so if you forgot what you named a document, you can still find if only you can remember some of the words inside the document. Search results display as you type. Just click a result once to open it. (You can also press the up and down arrows and then return to choose a result.) Mac users: if you're not using Spotlight now, or not frequently, it's time to change your habits! Use it to open applications, rather than the Dock. Don't worry about where you saved your document, just Spotlight it! You'll see your efficiency go up the more you use Spotlight.

However, what if I also want to search the web, my Gmail, and my Google Docs? Currently, there's no way to do this. There is a cute little program you can download called Google Quick Search Box, which seems like it would be just the thing, but sadly, it isn't. Rather than showing you search results immediately, you can double-click to launch a Google search in your web browser. That's hardly faster than just going to the web browser and searching. Also, it doesn't integrate Gmail and Google Docs. Ugh. Come on, Google, give us what we want!

-Webb